dying of
curiosity. What has happened?"

"Oh, I can't tell you now," Freda answered, evasively. "I guess
everyone knew we were shipwrecked this afternoon."

Cora appeared at the door. "May we come to eat now?" she asked. "I
have only succeeded in making Denny stay with the understanding that
we won't keep him long. He is anxious to get back to his cabin."

"I am that," said Denny, following Cora into the dining room. "Can't
tell what'll happen now."

"Then something _did_ happen," Bess said aside, to Marita. "I can't
imagine what."

"Now you must eat a good meal," Mrs. Lewis insisted to Denny. "I
remember well how you always loved macaroni and cheese."

"And I remember well how you fixed it up," answered Denny, gallantly.
"This is a bit like the old days; isn't it? When I used to eat you out
of house and home, when Len would fetch me into your house to tempt me
appetite," and he chuckled at the recollection. "Freddie, you were
only a tot then, but you could climb on my knee right smart. I guess
you were always a romp." This last was plainly intended as a
compliment, for Denny smiled at Freda as she handed him his steaming
coffee.

If the young folks thought that by special attention to Denny and his
wants at the table they might get an inkling of the mystery that had
so excited the old man they were disappointed, for he never betrayed a
word of it, and only an occasional absent look in his sober gray eyes
betokened anything unusual.

He scarcely took time to swallow the tempting food, however, when he
jumped up and declared he could not stay another minute, although
Cora, Freda, and Mrs. Lewis urged him to remain.

"I must run--I really must," he insisted, "and mind what I tell you,"
to Freda and Cora, "look out for yourselves!"

CHAPTER XIV

AN ANGRY DRUGGIST

"We didn't want to make a fuss over it before the boys," Cora
explained to a number of the girls, who, next morning, were seated
about the bungalow side porch, trying to get in a few stitches of
embroidery. "They would be sure to go straight at those land fellows,
and we think--Denny and all of us--that the best way to do is to watch
them carefully for a while."

"But what happened?" demanded Lottie, impatiently.

"We don't know exactly what, but it appears that while Denny was out,
fishing us in, someone entered his shack and ransacked it."

"Burglars! What for? In that hut!" exclaimed Belle.

"We don't know that, either," continued